Demonstrators protest London stadium hosting arms fair with firms that sell weapons to Israel

By Burak Bir

LONDON (AA) – Demonstrators in London on Monday protested a local stadium hosting an arms fair with firms that make weapons Israel uses against Gaza.

Gathered in front of Twickenham Rugby Stadium, the protesters decried the UK's Rugby Football Union letting the stadium in southwest London host the International Armoured Vehicle Fair.

Protesters said that the fair and a similar event next month will be attended by companies that make weapons used by Israel.

Carrying Palestinian flags, the crowd held signs reading "Stop arming Israel," "Genocide enablers," and "Drop goals not bombs."

Along with the famed slogan "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free," they also chanted “Netanyahu you will see, Palestine will be free” and "Judaism yes, Zionism no, the state of Israel has to go."

The group also criticized the stadium hosting the fair, saying: "Twickenham Stadium you cannot hide, we will charge you with genocide."

The protesters also left rugby balls painted blood red in front of the stadium.

Speaking to Anadolu, 25-year-old protester Anara said that she was protesting for the over 25,000 people in Gaza that have been killed in Israeli attacks since Oct. 7.

"I’m here for the dad that I saw today on Instagram, clawing his way through piles of rubble, just to bury his 7-month-old daughter. This is why I'm here," she explained.

Anara said she could not understand the indifference to children starving in Gaza and even having their limbs amputated without anesthesia, saying: "It's one of the most disgusting things that I've ever had to witness.”

She added: "And even if we’re not Palestinian, we must stand for Palestine, we must.”

Anara also said every company that is selling in Israel right now, every company that is buying products from Israel, "they are all complicit in this."

"If we stand together we can make a difference," she said.

- 'It's a shame, unhuman, barbaric'

Sol, from Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) Richmond and Kingston, told Anadolu that Twickenham Stadium "has blood on their hands."

On the 25,000 civilians killed by Israel, most of them women and children, she said: “It's a shame. Shame on Twickenham Stadium … It’s unhuman, it’s barbaric."

On the British government’s failure to call for a permanent cease-fire, Sol said this "is outrageous,” adding that “humanity has gone.”

“Twickenham Stadium with all its arms, weapons, all its delivery coming into this building today, have blood on their hands," she said, raising her hands in blood-red gloves.

"We want it to stop, cease-fire now," added Sol.

Ahead of the start of the fair, the group Palestine Action sprayed in red on a stadium gate: “Free Gaza."

Israel launched a deadly offensive on the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by Hamas on Oct. 7, killing at least 25,295 Palestinians and injuring 63,000. Nearly 1,200 Israelis are believed to have been killed in the Hamas attack.

The Israeli offensive has left 85% of Gaza’s population internally displaced amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave’s infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.